Linden Hills is a delightful urban community in the southwest corner of Minneapolis. It’s sort of a city within a city, tucked between two lakes, Calhoun and Harriet. In 2004 the Linden Hills Neighborhood Council (LHINC) decided it would be a good idea to have a neighborhood Poet Laureate -- to use poetry as one more way to bring the community together. I’m it.
We put on events -- poetry readings, slams and salons -- throughout the year. Questions? get in touch
This collection of 75 poems by 11 poets who live in the Linden Hills neighborhood of Minneapolis will make you laugh, make you think, break your heart and give you hope.
A great gift for anyone who likes poetry or has ties to the City of Lakes. Perfect for birthdays, Christmas, hostess gifts, Father’s Day, Mother’s Day... and when the kids leave home... or come back.
Available at Linden Hills merchants or directly from Trolley Car Press. $20 includes tax, postage, shipping and handling. wilhide@skypoint.com
POEM OF THE MOMENT
CONTACT US: wilhide@skypoint.com
AMAZINGLY GOOD POETRY FROM AN EXTRAORDINARY CORNER OF THE CITY OF LAKES
UPCOMING EVENTS
Southwest Journal -- The Spring Poetry Project spread is due out April 5. Deadline for poems is March 15 (the Ides!) Send your best work to wilhide@skypoint.com. To see earlier issues, go to swjournal.com, click on the “search archives” button and search for wilhide
The Southwest Journal
is a newspaper published twice a month for the neighborhoods of southwest Minneapolis. I’m the poetry editor. Four times a year we print a two-page spread of local poetry and also put the poems on line.
To submit poems, send text to wilhide@skypoint.com or mail them to:
Doug Wilhide, 3019 West 43rd Street
Minneapolis, MN 554410
The next deadline is: 3/15/ 2010
The next Southwest Journal Poetry Project spread will come out on April 5
To view previous editions, click on the link below and search for “wilhide”.
http://www.swjournal.com/index.php?section=84&publication=southwest
Fragments on my mind...
...standing on a corner/In Winslow, Arizona
And such a fine sight to see:
Its a girl, my lord, in a flatbed Ford
slowin’ down to take a look at me.
Come on, baby, don’t say maybe
I gotta know if your sweet love is
Gonna save me.
We may lose and we may win
Though we will never be here again
So open up, I’m climbin’ in,
So take it easy...
-- from “Take it Easy,” Jackson Browne, Glen Frey
Haze grey and underway/a world away from you... and miles and miles of blue.
-- theme from PBS show CARRIER.
I don’t want clever conversation
Never want to work that hard
I just want someone that I can talk to
I want you just the way you are
-- from Just the Way You are by Billy Joel
You can tell at a glance what a swell night this is for romance; you can hear Mother Nature murmuring low, “Let yourself go.”
-- from It’s De-Lovely by Cole Porter
Venus de Milo was noted for her charms.
But, just between us,
you’re cuter than Venus,
and, what’s more... you’ve got arms!
-- from Love Is Just Around the Corner, lyrics by Leo Robin.
I got the time and the place and the rhythm
All I need is the girl to go with ’em
-- from All I Need is the Girl by Stephen Sondheim.
© 2010 Doug Wilhide
Singing the Blues
Blue whales are in the news again
this time -- good for them --
not because of imminent extinction
but something more interesting: singing.
Seems they have lowered their voices,
dropped their mating calls a few octaves,
and are bouncing love songs around the ocean
like moonbeams off of palm trees.
Instead of calling I love you, I love you, I love you
in an operatic basso profundo
they now call I love you, I love you, I love you
so deeply we can hardly hear them at all.
There are many theories for this deeper
bass line in the blue whale choir:
global warming, naval exercises, funky krill,
tsunamis, or maybe the Chinese.
But I think there’s a simpler explanation:
some girl blue off the coast near Monterey
has sent a voice mail out to some boy blue
a couple miles down near Maui:
Hey big fella, I gotta know,
Hey big fella, I gotta know:
Hey big fella, how low can you go?
Hey big fella, how low can you go?